ANALYSIS OF STUDENTS’ WRITING IN FACEBOOK AS SOCIAL MEDIA VIEWED FROM GRAMMAR ERROR

Kiki Kartika Widiyanti

e-mail: Ansharikiki@gmail.com

Department of English Education Faculty Of Teaching And Educational Science University ff  Swadaya Gunung Jati Cirebon

 

ABSTRACT

Nowadays many people especially teenager like to communicate using media social. The activity that is often do is writing, whereas they must write posting, comment, and other activity in social media. One of media social is Facebook, and there are many of Facebook groups that is made for learning English. The study investigates what kind of grammar error of students’ writing in Facebook and what the impacts of Facebook in students’ writing skill. the sample of this study is 20 students of English Department of education Faculty in Unswagati Cirebon who is entered in a Facebook Group that is created by Joseph Crossman a teacher from Canada, the group is called “FREE ENGLISH LESSON”. The data for analyzing the grammar error were got from students’ comment in a post of the Facebook group was hosted by facebook here:

https://m.facebook.com/groups/229018263888796?view=permalink&id=248483681942254&refid=12&_ft_. Moreover, survey close-ended question using likert scale was applied, to find the impacts of Facebook for student’s writing skill. the result shows that punctuation is the highest grammar error that often do by the students and Facebook give some positive impacts for students’ writing and grammar skill.

Key word: Facebook, students’ writing, grammar error, impact

I.                   Introduction

Nowadays many people like to communicate using social media or social network. It has become consumption for people in this era. Nothing they do in everyday without on-line in their Facebook account to up-date their status or just comment their friend status. Selwyn in Yunus (2009:88) reported that many kinds of media social they use, but the most popular social media is Facebook . Many of the users of Facebook are students where they are teenagers. Yunus and Salehi (2012: 87) found that students and adolescent waste their time in Facebook or social network heavy emphasis in social need. 

Although the Facebook is made by American, but the highest user of Facebook is Indonesian. Lim in Yunus (2010:87) found Indonesia was the highest user of Facebook in Asia; there are 18, 9 million of users. See this matter Indonesia has big potential in using Facebook as media to learning English.

Yunus and Salehi (2012: 87) reported that the development of ICT (Information Communication Technology) make the several of teaching and learning process. Social network especially Facebook is one of the ICT that will make the students easier to study, because many of them have known how to use almost the entire features of Facebook. There are posting post, chat, comment, sharing that the entire feature make they can socialize in network. Moreover, Facebook have another features to make a group that consist of unlimited members. The group is controlled by admin where they can give comment, post and share something, or even chat with other members without knowing by the other person who is not the member of the group, so that they will learn comfortably.

Almost of the activity in the facebook is writing. The students like using facebook to update their status, give their comment, chatting, and posting post by writing. The activities in Facebook help the students to learn in writing process. Students will be usual to write and it will make good habitual to learn English especially in writing. But, it is usually using informal language in Facebook, whereas they are free to give their opinion or comment. Therefore, the grammar of sentences in their writing will be faced of error.

This study was limited to observe 20 students’ writing of Unswagati Cirebon in Facebook with formulated the following research question:

1.      What is grammar error found in students’ writing on Facebook?

2.      What are students’ responses towards the impacts of Facebook on the students’ writing skill?

II.                Literature Review

2.1. Writing

Writing is one of skill in English that is important to learn beside other skill like speaking, reading, and listening. This skill is one of English skill that is difficult to learn. Westwood (2008:56) tells that “writing is perhaps the most difficult skill to acquire because its development involves the effective coordination of many different cognitive, linguistic and psycho-motor processes”. It means that writing needs to learn deeply to make good a sentence.

2.1.1. Sentence Writing

Writing a sentence is very important to EFL (English Foreign Learner), because it will influence their writing skill. Ehrilch (2000) descibes that sentence is group of words that make a statement and can be followed by full stop, introgative, and exclamation. Term to make a sentence must have a subject and verb, if one of  these elements not owned, then it can not be called a sentence.

2.1.2  Classification

According to Radford (2009:1) sentence can be clasified beside on the structure and the purpose.

a.      Structure

One traditional scheme for classifying English sentences is by clause structure, the number and types of clauses in the sentence with finite verbs.

1.    A simple sentence consists of a single independent clause with no dependent clauses.

2.    A compound sentence consists of multiple independent clauses with no dependent clauses. These clauses are joined together using conjunctions, punctuation, or both.

3.    A complex sentence consists of one independent clause and at least one dependent clause.

4.    A complex-compound sentence (or compound-complex sentence) consists of multiple independent clauses, at least one of which has at least one dependent clause.

b.      Purpose

Sentences can also be classified based on their purpose:

1.    A declarative sentence or declaration, the most common type, commonly makes a statement: "I have to go to study."

2.    An interrogative sentence or question is commonly used to request information : "Do I have to go to study?"

3.    An exclamatory sentence or exclamation is generally a more emphatic form of statement expressing emotion: "I have to go to work!"

4.    An imperative sentence or command tells someone to do something (and if done strongly may be considered both imperative and exclamatory): "Go to Study." or "Go to Study!"

2.2  Facebook

2.2.1.      Facebook as Social Media

Many of the users in social network sites especially Facebook is teenagers. Lenhart,Madden, Smith, & Macgill in Mc.daniel (2007: 135) reported that “some experts found the number of online teens had risen and their uses of online resources were increasingly social. Look this matter many of teenager like to use social media such Facebook, they like to communicate or chat with their friend use Facebook.

Althoughit is booming in teenager life, but it also appears as transitioning process in education. It is like an epert says where Karlin (2007: 7) reported that “almost 60% of students who use social networking talk about education online, and more than 50% talk about specific school work.”So, the use of social network also influence their activity to get information about their school work. It means that social network can help in education performance.

2.2.2 Facebook and Learning Writing

“the use of online discussion groups offers a relatively new avenue through which the learner can take an active role in the learning process.” While Thomas in white (2002) suggested online discussions improved high levels of cognitive engagement and critical thinking. Therefore, it shows the habitual of writing in Facebook especially Facebook group automatically improve in writing.

Yancey in Yunus (2012:90) reported “the use of FB in helping students make link in order to make them better writers.” Therefore, Facebook especially Facebook group has the potential to improve students writing skills by being the link between writing and communication.

Kabilan in Yunus (2012: 90) described that “while sharing views, exchanging messages and comments on FB, students certainly develop a confidence in English writing as a byproduct of their online socialization.”Moreover, Facebook make up for learning meaning. The member of group can give the ideas and share them. Furthermore, their friends are able to give the response, so it will build the feedback for the other member to. These show that writing skills are very much emphasized in FB group participation and thus has a high potential of improving students’ writing skills.

2.3              Error Analysis

English foreign learner is disposed to make error when they deliver English both in writing and speaking.  James (2013:1) described that  errors in foreign language teaching especially in English are the cases which are quite difficult to avoid. Error analysis is the process of determinating the incidence, nature, causes, and consequences of unsuccessful language.

2.3.1.     The Differences Between Error and Mistake

Sometimes we confuse to differentiate between error and mistake. James (2013: 78) described: 

“If the learner is inclined and able to correct a fault in his or her output, it is assumed that the form he or she selected was not the one intended, and we shall say that the fault is a mistake. If, on the other hand, the learner is unable or in any way disinclined to make the correction, we assume that the form the learner used was the one intended, and that it is an error. “

According the theory above, it can be taken a conclusion that mistake is made by a learner is caused by their carelessness  and they can correct their mistake by theirself  if there is an agent or we can say in here  it is a teacher  who can show their  mistake. Different with mistake, error can’t be corrected by theirself  because they do an errror caused by their unknowledge. They must know  about the system error in their  form language, so they will be able to corect their error.

James (2013: 83) reported that errors cannot be self-corrected until further relevant (to that error) input (implicit or explicit) has been provided and converted into intake by the learner. In other words, errors require further relevant learning to take place before they can be self-corrected.

2.3.2.     The Causes of Error

According to Norish in Sattayatham (2008), there are some causes of errors that the English foreign learner do:

1)   Overgeneralization, that is error caused by extension of language target rules where they do not apply.

2)   Interference, that is error caused by resulting from transfer grammatical elements from source language to target language.

3)   Carelessness, that is error of lack in motivation, memory lapses, and confusion.

2.3.3.               The Kinds of Error

There are some kinds of error that usually english foreign learner do. According to Corder errors divided into four categories:

1)      Omission

Certain linguistic forms may be omitted by the learners because of their complexity in production. Omission also occurs in morphology. Learners often leave out the third person singular morpheme –s, the plural marker –s and the past tense inflection –ed. A learner could say, for example: “I watch the movie last night”. Instead of: “I watched the movie last night”.

2)      Addition

Learners not only omit elements which they regard as redundant but they also add redundant element.

For example:  “I swims” and “The books is here”

Instead of: “I swim” and “The book is here”

3)        Selection

Learners commit errors in pronunciation, morphology, syntax and vocabulary due to the selection of the wrong, phoneme, morpheme, structure or vocabulary item. For example: “Fika is smartest than Femy”.

Instead of  “Fika is smarter than Femy”.

4)      Ordering

Miss-ordering can occur in morphological level. Miss-ordering of bound morpheme in English is perhaps less frequent, given their limited number, but in the example “He is got upping now”, the learners attaches the inflection –ing to the particle of the two words verb “get up”.

2.4.      The Grammatical Error in Writing

There are some the grammatical errors that are usually found in the students’ writing, according to Ehrilch (2010:1):

2.4.1.     Sentence Pattern

Ehrlich (2000:1) described subject is the word that tells you who or what performed the action of the verb. Almost all English sentences contain a subject (S) and a verb (V). The verb may or may not be followed by an object (O). This means that the Subject comes before the Verb, which comes before the Object.

Examples:

-      Birds fly

     (S)    (V)

-      The baby cries

(S)          (V)

-           The student need a pen

(S)            (V)    (O)

Verb is a word or phrase that describes an action, condition or experience.Verbs that are not followed by an object are called “intransitive verbs.” Common intransitive verbs: agree, arrive, come, cry, exist, go, happen, live, occur, rain, rise, sleep, stay, walk. Verbs that are followed by an object are called “transitive verb.” Common transitive verbs: build, cut, find, like, make, need, send, use, want. Some verbs can be either intransitive or transitive. Transitive; A student studied. Intransitive; A student studied books. Subjects and objects of verbs are nouns (or pronouns). Examples of nouns are : person, place, thing, John, pen, information, appearance).

2.4.2. Tense

Tense is the characteristic of verb that shows event happens or describes situation. There are 6 tense in English: present, past perfect, past, present perfect, future, and future perfect. Present shows habitual occurance now, truth of public and past shows the past event. For example:

Present                            Past

I call                               I called

I am calling                     I was calling

2.4.3.  Pronoun

A pronoun is a word that is used in the place of a noun or noun phrase. Usually when a noun or noun phrase has been used once, a pronoun is used to avoid repetition of the same noun or noun phrase. Personal pronouns are words such as:

1)   First person pronouns, example words that represent or include the speaker or writer.

Singular         :  I, me, my, mine

Plural            :  we, us, our, ours

2)   Second person pronouns, example words that represent the person or people  who is/are being addressed.

Singular        :  you, your, yours

Plural                        :  you, your, yours

3)   Third person pronouns, example words that represent people or things other than the speaker/writer and the listener/reader.

Singular        :  he, him, his, she, her, it, its

Plural            :  they, them, their, theirs

2.4.4.  Preposition

Preposition has been called the biggest little words in English. They are usually quite short and significant looking, but they have very important functions. Prepositions are always followed by nouns (or pronouns). They are connective words that show the relationship between the nouns following them and one of the basic sentence element: subject, verb, object, or compliment. They usually indicate relationships, such as position, place, direction time, manner, agent, possession, and condition, between their objects and other parts of the sentence. The following list illustrates the use of prepositional phrases to convey specific kinds of information.

-          Place, position: across, after, against, among, around, at, before, behind, below, between, by, in, in front of, inside, near, on , on top of, opposite, outside, over, to, under, underneath.

-          Direction: across, at, by way of, down, into, out of, to through, toward, up upon.

-          Time: about, after, around, at before, by, during, from ... to, from ... until, in.

-          Purpose, reason: for

-          Possession: of

-          Manner, instrument: by, in, like, with.

-          Identification: at, by, in, on, with.

-          Distance: for

-          Agent: by

-          Material: with

-          Quantity: by

2.4.5.      Punctuation

Punctuation is the use of special marks that you add to writing to separate phrases and sentences, to show that something is a question, etc. Punctuation is not something you impose upon a sentence after you have written it out. Commas, semicolons, and the other marks are an intimate part of grammar and style. To write well, you must punctuate well; but to punctuate well, you must also write well. Punctuation mark used in punctuation, for example: full stops/periods, commas, semicolon, question mark, apostrophe, capitalization, etc.

2.4.6.      Spelling

Spelling words in English can be difficult for learners because sometimes a word is very similar to a word in their own language but is not spelled the same or also they confuse how to write a word exactly that is usually called misspellings. For example, spell success with only one ‘s’, or ahead without an ‘a’. Another thing that makes spelling difficult is that some words in English do not sound exactly as they are spelled. In the word definitely, for example, the second ‘i’ sounds more like an ‘a’.

III.               Research Methodology

3.1. Research Design

In a research, the researchers must have a design where they can solve their research. Kothari (2004: 31) reported that “the formidable problem that follows the task of defining the research problem is the preparation of the design of the research project, popularly known as the research design”. In other word research design is important to find or solve problems that will be observed. Singh (2006 : 1) reported “research is simply the process of arriving as dependable solution to a problem through the planned and systematic collection, analysis and interpretation of data.” Relevant with the purpose and the research question in this study, descriptive analysis design is applied for this research.

3.2. Population and Sample

In a research there is a population to be oberserved. According to Fraenkel (2011:91) defined that “Population as the large group to which one hopes to apply the result “. The population for this paper is students of English Department of Education Faculty in Unswagati Cirebon.

 To get the sample in this study, the researcher takes 20 students in English Department of Education Faculty in Unswagati Cirebon.

3.3.          Instrument and Procedure

To get the data from the participants, the researcher use transcription from students’ comment in Facebook and survey questionnaire as the instruments.

According to Gass and Selinker (2001:79) there are some steps to analyze errors, those are identify errors, classify errors, quantify error, and analysis of causes. The writer will use that error analysis steps and follow descriptive analysis technique with using the percentage from total number of students’ error and divided with total item of the word.

The formula is according to Gay in Rina (2012) :

 

Notes:

P: Percentage

X: Frequency (the number of each errors in writing)

Y: the total of errors in writing

The analysis of data that the researcher gets from the questionnaire, it will be taken by two parts of questionnaire. First the researcher  asks the writing skill with 6 items and second part ask about grammar skill with 5 items by using survey close-ended questionnaire to find how the facebook group influence the participants’ writing by using likert scale.

The cathegories of the scale are “Strongly Agree”, “Agree”, “Neutral”, “Disagree”, and “Strongly Disagree”. The technique that is used to summarizing the cathegory uses frequency table or proposition table to get the percentage.

The formula is according to Fraenkel (2008: 207):

Where:

P: Percentage

F: Frequency

N: Respondent

IV.              Research Finding and Discussion

4.1              Grammar Errors Found in Students Writing

Table 1. Result of The Data Analysis

After the writer have been analyzed and calculate the data, it showed that the most errors in student writing from their comment in facebook group is punctuation with the percentage 70 %. Moreover, second error is spelling with the percentage 7,5 %, third error is pronoun with the percentage 8,75 %, the fourth is sentence pattern and tense with the percentage 5 %and the last is preposition with the percentage 3,75 %.

4.2           The Students Response Toward the Impact of Facebook on Their Writing

To know what the students’ response toward the impacts of facebook for students’s writing skill, the writer collected the data from survey questionnaire that is included of two part of questionnaire about writing skill and grammar skill.

Table 2. Questionnaire A (Writing Skill)

No	Items	Strongly Agree %	Agree %	Neutral %	Disagree %	Strongly Disagree %
1	I think it's a good idea to use Facebook topractice writing skills in English	35	60	5	0	0
2	I learn to write better in English using Facebook	10	40	50	0	0
3	I can express my ideas freely in Facebook	25	50	10	10	0
4	I can be more creative in expressing my ideas in Facebook	15	65	10	10	0
5	I am more confident with my writing ability using Facebook	10	40	45	15	0
6	I can write longer in English thanks toFacebook	0	30	50	20	0

In the table 2, the writer finds that 60 % of students agree that using facebook to practice writing in English is good idea and as many of 50% and 65% agree that they can express their ideas and more creative to express their ideas but they give neutral attitude in A2,A5, and A6 that they neither agree or disagree that using facebook can make their writing better, feel confident to writing and write longer. It shows that using facebook can help the students in expressing ideas but uncertain to improve their writing skill.

Table 3. Part B (Grammar Skill)

No	Items	Strongly Agree %	Agree %	Neutral %	Disagree %	Strongly Disagree %
1	In general I feel that my English grammar has somehow improved	0	40	50	0	0
2	I can use different word forms in English	5	75	20	0	0
3	I am more active in checking up meaning of difficult words in the dictionary	20	65	5	10	0
4	when using Facebook: My skill in guessing meanings of word improved	15	65	15	5	0
5	I learn more new words when reading my friends' post	45	50	5	0	0

in the table 3, the writer findss that the sudents feel uncertain that Facebook can improve their grammar skill or not. With neutral answer, it can be meant that they agree or disagree. On the other hand, in the question B2, B3, B4 and B5 with the percentage 75%, 65%, 65%, and 50%, they give positive respons that they can use different word forms in English and more active to finds meaning of difficult words in the dictionary. Moreover, thay also feel that their skill in guessing meaning of word improved and learn more new word when they read their friend posting in Facebook.

4.3              Discussion

from all the analysis of the students’ writing comments in facebook that have been analyzed by the writer, it shows that the most grammar errors that the students often do is punctuation error that included into omission, addition, and selecting punctuation. Those errors are caused by the students’ carelessness to put punctuation exactly when they write a comment. However, it is not suitable with the study of Shih (2011) who reported that Facebook improves the students’ motivation in writing. Meanwhile, in the fact, the findings show that many of students lack in motivation to write a sentence in their comment rightly exactly to put punctuation.

However, almost of students do not write too formal because Facebook is social media where the written communication is most used. It is suitable with Marie (2008) who described informal is flexible and not less rigid. Therefore, the students get less motivation to write comment in facebook by following the grammatical rules especially in using punctuation.

Based on the results of survey questionnaire, the questionnaire A (see table 2) that focused on the impact of using facebook on students’ writing skill based on the students’ perception shows that Facebook can help the students to express their ideas, it is suitable with Thomas in Yunus (2002) who suggested online discussion improved high levels of cognitive engagement and critical thinking. On the other hand, the students do not certain that facebook improves their writing skill because many of them choose neutral. If the neutral is judged not give opinion, so the result of the students’ perception shows that facebook can improve their writing skill and it is suitable with Yancey in Yunus (2012:99) who reported that the use of facebook can help them better writers.

Moreover, based on the questionnaire part B (see table 3) that is focused on the impacts of the students’ grammar skill that is looked from the students’ perception shows that facebook can help them to improve grammar skill. It is showed from 5 items in the questionnaire, 4 from them answer agree. They agree that facebook can make them using different word forms in English. They also more active to open their dictionary when they find difficult word and their skill in guessing meaning word is improved. Moreover, they can  learn more new word when they read their friend posting in facebook. So, it is suitable with Kabilan in Yunus (2012:99) who described that the activity in Facebook can develop a confidence in English writing as a byproduct of their online socialization.

V.                 Conclusion and Sugesstion

5.1. Conclusion

According to the analysis of students’ writing from their comment in Facebook that have been analyzed by the writer and also the questionnaire that has been given to the 20 students which is the sample of this research. It can be taken two conclusions:

1.      According to the six grammar errors that is made by the student’s of English department of Education Faculty of Unswagati Cirebon in writing comment on Facebook,  it was showed the first error that is many found is punctuation; the second is spelling; the third is pronoun; the fourth is sentence pattern and  tense; and the last is preposition. So, punctuation is the grammar error that is many found in the students’ writing on Facebook.

2.      Meanwhile, beside on the result of the questionnaire most of students agreed that facebook can increase their writing and grammar skill.

5.2. Suggestion

From the studythat has been researched, there are some suggestions for:

1.      Students who want to learn English on Facebook  still have to pay attention  to English writing exactly beside on the rule of right English grammar. It will make them accustomed towrite English rightly.

2.      English Teacher can use facebook as a media for teaching English writing through a Facebook group.

3.      Other researcher who wants to investigate the use of Facebook as learning media, it needs further research that is not only focused on writing skill but also another skills such as speaking, reading, and listening. Moreover, further research also can use another social media for learning English.

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